Faye Tonks: Book 1, Year 4
by justwriteit1
Summary: Faye Tonks is the sister of Nymphadora Tonks. She's a Gryffindor Student but everyone seems to forget about her, except for her best friends Sybil and Rose, although they're in Ravenclaw. Read and see how she makes more friends, becomes less shy, and becomes more brave. Harry Potter/OC/ Any chapter with unsuitable content will have a warning at the start. Read and Review.
1. Chapter 1

"Faye!" shouted Mother. "For heaven's sake Faye will you get down here? You're going to be late!"

"I'm coming Mother!" I shouted back.

I raced down the stairs and looked at my mother who had tears in her eyes. Her long, curly jet-black hair tied up courtly in a tight bun, she pulled me into a bone-crushing hug. I stared across the room to my dad, his wide smile brightening up the sitting-room. I noticed my sister sitting on one of the green armchairs, with her feet up on the table, hair a violent shade of purple. She was sipping her butterbear while laughing at me being smothered by mother.

"You'd swear she was going to Hogwarts as a first year," she stated.

"We're just worried that's all, Dora," said Father reassuringly. "You've read the prophet," he whispered, while walking up to her chair, leaning forward and placing his mouth to her ear. "The Dark Mark at the Quidditch World Cup, if that's not a warning, then what is?"

"Nymphie's right though, I'm not a baby, last time I checked, I'm fourteen!"

I call her Nymphie _**(Pronounced Niffie)**_****because her name is Nymphadora, which she hates, and she gets everyone to call her Tonks, which I can't, Tonks being my second name too. Mum and Dad call her Dora, but I prefer to be different, although I call her Dora when talking about her.

"You're still a squirt if you ask me…" skitted Dora.

"Just because you're twenty-one and an auror doesn't mean you can skit everyone who's seven years younger than you!" I retaliated.

"Still a squirt…" she got up off her chair and walked up to me. She wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close. "They're right you know," she whispered. "You _need_to be careful, and watch your hair; it tends to go red when I tease you."

"Thanks," I whispered.

"We better be heading," called Dad. "We don't want you to be late for the first day of the year."

"We better not," said Mum, smiling. "Good luck."

She pulled me into another one of her bone-crushing hugs. She slid her fingers through my long, straight black hair. She murmured "It will be okay," and "No need to worry." I wanted to shout that it wasn't me who was worrying, it was bloody you and Dad! But I bit my tongue.

She finally released me and I stepped back into Dad's arms.

"Bye Faye!" cried Mum, drying her tiers.

"See ya Faye," chimed Dora.

"See you Nymphs, bye Mum!"

We apparated to King's Cross Station. It was ten to eleven and Dad pointed to his watch.

"We'll be on time! Geez, stop worrying!"

He placed his hand on my shoulder. "I'll stop worrying when you become properly punctual. And Faye, be careful. The Dark Mark is much, much more than a snake coming out of a skull's mouth, it's his mark, your mum doesn't want me to tell you this, but many of us think he's trying to come back, but he's not fully fledged yet you see, sending someone else out to do his bidding I expect. Promise me you'll be careful."

"I promise Dad," I said quietly.

"Now go on."

"Bye Dad."

He nodded as I ran towards the long brick wall. I began to run towards it with much determination. I pushed my trolley in front of me as my grey feathered owl began tweaking. I found myself on the other side, beside me was red and black train, the Hogwarts Express. I looked around me and saw young wizards and witches, some of whom I didn't recognise, but most I did. I walked onto the train and unloaded my luggage. I looked around for my friends, Rose and Sybil. I couldn't find them anywhere, until finally I came across their compartment.

"Hey Faye," said Rose. Her hair was even redder than the previous year. "How've you been?"

"Fine," I answered honestly. "Mum's been pretty jumped up bout this Dark Mark thing, Dora is pretty cool bout it though, although she's scared and Dad, well he's been a little off edge, and he's terrified about the prospect of You-Know-Who coming back, but he doesn't want to say it."

"We didn't ask for your whole life story, Faye," said Sybil laughing. "But yeah, my mum's worried as well, last time he was – er – powerful, he killed Dad, and she's afraid he'll want to finish off what he started when – I mean if – he comes back."

"I haven't told my parents," said Rose. "They're muggles, and there's no need to tell them either, they'll be scared out of their wits! They know about You-Know-Who, McGonagall told them, they didn't want be a witch when they found out about him, said it was too dangerous, then McGonagall told them that he was gone, and they calmed down, but if they hear he's coming back, they'll pull me out of Hogwarts and I'll never be allowed back in the Wizarding World again!"

"Did either of you go to the Quidditch World Cup?" I asked.

"Neither of us," said Sybil. "And lucky we didn't, did you hear what they did with the muggles?"

"Yeah," I said. "It was sick."

"Why did they do that though," said Rose. "I mean harm muggles. It was completely unnecessary! They were innocent! Did nothing wrong!"

"I know. I suppose it's their idea of 'fun'," said Sybil. "They may have used it as a warning though. That You-Know-Who is coming back, and that they were demonstrating their power."

"Terrible immature bastards!" shouted Rose. "Muggles aren't that bad! Most of them accept wizardry, but still, some of us taunt them! It's outrageous! It's the reason I want to be in the Ministry of Magic when I'm older, to stop these injustices, and encourage muggle and –"

"Ranting on again about your love of muggles are you, Richards?" said a boy with snowy white hair. His eyes were grey and his face pale and I recognised who he was immediately, Draco Malfoy. A Slytherin in my year who thinks he's all that because his family is rich and are pure-bloods, disgusting. It means they have no muggle ancestry. Behind him were two stocky boys named Crabbe and Goyle, his little puppets.

"Shut up Malfoy!" snapped Sybil.

"I thought a respectable pure-blood like you Fawley wouldn't be seen walking around with the likes of Tonks and that mudblood."

"How dare you!" I shouted.

"Hey Tonks," he sneered. "Backing up for mudbloods now are we? Just before I thought you couldn't get any lower."

"Piss off Malfoy," shouted Sybil.

"See you in school," and then he walked off to presumably torment some first years.

Rose was sobbing in the corner. It was a terrible thing to be called a mudblood. It was a word a bigot would call a muggle-born, a person with muggle parents. Rose was barely ever called one, and she was very insecure and shy towards people, so being bullied was the thing that really started her.

"Don't listen to him," I comforted. "He's an idiot. He thinks he's all that because he's a pure-blood, it's idiocy, you're ten times as good as him in school, and besides, your dad isn't under suspicion of being a death eater, while his is, so who's winning?"

Rose, for some reason, laughed. "You always know the right thing to say, Faye, thank you."

"No problem."

For the rest of the journey he talked about school, the professors and homework. Being friends with two bright Ravenclaws meant that books and school was the main thing we talked about. I didn't mind though, I had always wondered why I had been put into Gryffindor despite my love for learning and my brains, although not nearly as good as Sybil's, Rose's or Hermione Granger's, a girl with whom I shared a dormitory with and was on good terms with. I didn't possess any great courage or bravery, I have always been more into books and studying than being the hero.

"We're here," Sybil announced.

We got up and made our way out of the train, bumping into many students along the way.

When we got to the Great Hall, I noticed there was one seat empty. McGonagall hadn't yet entered, but I saw her before coming in, but there was another seat empty, the one that was last year filled by Professor Lupin. I walked over to the Gryffindor table and took a seat beside Parvati, an Indian girl also in my year. She and Lavender were chatting about the first divination lesson, I hated divination, but it was easy, so I continued it.

"Hey Faye," said Parvati kindly. "Are you doing Divination this year?"

"Yep," I answered. I knew they liked Divination, so I kept my mouth shut.

"Isn't it wonderful!" Lavender beamed. "Professor Trelawney is so accurate, isn't she?"

"The best," I joined in.

"Oh Lav, the Sorting Hat is going to sing," said Parvati, pointing up to the stool on which the Sorting Hat lay. It was very ugly and ragged, it was brown and had a slit for a mouth.

"A thousand years or more ago,

When I was newly sewn,

There lived four wizards of renown,

Whose names are still well known:

Bold Gryffindor, from wild moor,

Fair Ravenclaw, from glen,

Sweet Hufflepuff, from valley broad,

Shrewd Slytherin, from fin.

They shared a wish, a hope, a dream,

They hatched a daring plan

To educate young sorcerers

Thus Hogwarts School began.

Now each of these four founders

Formed their own house, for each

Did value different virtues

In the ones they had to teach.

By Gryffindor, the bravest were

Prized far beyond the rest;

For Ravenclaw, the cleverest

Would always be the best;

For Hufflepuff, hard workers were

Most worthy of admission;

And power-hungry Slytherin

Loved those of great ambition.

While still alive they did divide

Their favorites from the throng,

Yet how to pick the worthy ones

When they were dead and gone?

'Twas Gryffindor who found the way,

He whipped me off his head

The founders put some brains in me

So I could choose instead!

Now slip me snug about your ears,

I've never yet been wrong,

I'll have a look inside your mind

And tell where you belong!

The Great Hall rang with applause as the Sorting Hat finished.

"That's not the song it sang when it Sorted us," said the boy sitting next to me, clapping along with everyone else. He had jet-black hair and emerald green eyes, it was Harry Potter.

"Sings a different one every year," said Ron, his best friend. "It's got to be a pretty boring life, hasn't it, being a hat? I suppose it spends all year making up the next one."

The Sorting continued to sort the new first years into the respective houses.

"Creevey, Dennis!"

Tiny Dennis Creevey staggered forward, tripping over Hagrid's moleskin, just as Hagrid himself sidled into the Hall through a door behind the teachers' table. About twice as tall as a normal man, and at least three times as broad, Hagrid, with his long, wild, tangled black hair and beard, looked slightly alarming – a misleading impression, for Harry, Ron, Hermione and me knew Hagrid to possess a very kind nature. He winked at us as he sat down at the end of the staff table and watched Dennis Creevey putting on the Sorting Hat. The rip at the brim opened wide— -

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat shouted.

Hagrid clapped along with the Gryffindors as Dennis Creevey, beaming widely, took off the hat, placed it back on the stool, and hurried over to join his brother.

"Colin, I fell in!" he said shrilly, throwing himself into an empty seat. "It was brilliant! And something in the water grabbed me and pushed me back in the boat!"

"Cool!" said Colin, just as excitedly. "It was probably the giant squid, Dennis!"

"Wow!" said Dennis, as though nobody in their wildest dreams could hope for more than being thrown into a storm-tossed, fathoms-deep lake, and pushed out of it again by a giant sea monster.

"Dennis! Dennis! See that boy down there? The one with the black hair and glasses? See him? Know who he is, Dennis?"

Harry looked away, staring very hard at the Sorting Hat, now Sorting Emma Dobbs. I was laughing, yep another fan.

The Sorting continued; boys and girls with varying degrees of fright on their faces moving one by one to the three-legged stool, the line dwindling slowly as Professor McGonagall passed the L's.

"Oh hurry up," Ron moaned, massaging his stomach.

"Now, Ron, the Sorting's much more important than food," said Nearly Headless Nick as "Madley, Laura!" became a Hufflepuff.

"Course it is, if you're dead," snapped Ron.

"I do hope this year's batch of Gryffindors are up to scratch," said Nearly Headless Nick, applauding as "McDonald, Natalie!" joined the Gryffindor table.

"We don't want to break our winning streak, do we?"

Gryffindor had won the Inter-House Championship for the last three years in a row.

"Pritchard, Graham!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

"Quirke, Orla!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

And finally, with "Whitby, Kevin!" ("HUFFLEPUFF!"), the Sorting ended. Professor McGonagall picked up the hat and the stool and carried them away. "About time," said Ron, seizing his knife and fork and looking expectantly at his golden plate.

Professor Dumbledore had gotten to his feet. He was smiling around at the students, his arms opened wide in welcome.

"I have only two words to say to you," he told them, his deep voice echoing around the Hall. "Tuck in."

"Hear, hear!" said Harry and Ron loudly as the empty dishes filled magically before our eyes.

"Aaah, 'at's be'er," said Ron, with his mouth full of mashed potato.

Parvati and Lavender exchanged a look of disgust at the Gryffindor before beginning to eat themselves.

"He's disgusting!" whispered Lavender after swallowing a bit of chicken. "He stuffs his mouth with way too much food and then begins to have a nice chat with his friends as if he hasn't realised his mouth is holding a bucket worth of food!"

I continued to eat my meal quietly while everyone else chatted about one thing or another. Hermione was glaring at Ron whenever he talked with his mouth full and Harry would back Ron up. I listened silently to their conversations, not really eavesdropping, I was just bored.

When the puddings too had been demolished, and the last crumbs had faded off the plates, leaving them sparkling clean, Albus Dumbledore got to his feet again. The buzz of chatter filling the Hall ceased almost at once, so that only the howling wind and pounding rain could be heard.

"So!" said Dumbledore, smiling around at them all. "Now that we are all fed and watered," ("Hmph!" said Hermione) "I must once more ask for your attention, while I give out a few notices.

"Mr. Filch, the caretaker, has asked me to tell you that the list of objects forbidden inside the castle has this year been extended to include Screaming Yo-yos, Fanged Frisbees, and Ever-Bashing Boomerangs. The full list comprises some four hundred and thirty-seven items, I believe, and can be viewed in Mr. Filch's office, if anybody would like to check it."

The corners of Dumbledore's mouth twitched. He continued, "As ever, I would like to remind you all that the forest on the grounds is out-of-bounds to students, as is the village of Hogsmeade to all below third year. It is also my painful duty to inform you that the Inter-House Quidditch Cup will not take place this year."

"What?" Harry gasped. He looked around at Fred and George, his fellow members of the Quidditch team. They were mouthing soundlessly at Dumbledore, apparently too appalled to speak. Dumbhedore went on, "This is due to an event that will be starting in October, and continuing throughout the school year, taking up much of the teachers' time and energy - but I am sure you will all enjoy it immensely. I have great pleasure in announcing that this year at Hogwarts -"

But at that moment, there was a deafening rumble of thunder and the doors of the Great Hall banged open.

A man stood in the doorway, leaning upon a long staff, shrouded in a black traveling cloak. Every head in the Great Hall swiveled toward the stranger, suddenly brightly illuminated by a fork of lightning that flashed across the ceiling. He lowered his hood, shook out a long mane of grizzled, dark gray hair, then began to walk up toward the teachers' table.

A dull clunk echoed through the Hall on his every other step. He reached the end of the top table, turned right, and limped heavily toward Dumbledore. Another flash of lightning crossed the ceiling. Hermione gasped.

The lightning had thrown the man's face into sharp relief, and it was a face unlike any I had ever seen. It looked as though it had been carved out of weathered wood by someone who had only the vaguest idea of what human faces are supposed to look like, and was none too skilled with a chisel. Every inch of skin seemed to be scarred. The mouth looked like a diagonal gash, and a large chunk of the nose was missing. But it was the man's eyes that made him frightening.

One of them was small, dark, and beady. The other was large, round as a coin, and a vivid, electric blue. The blue eye was moving ceaselessly, without blinking, and was rolling up, down, and from side to side, quite independently of the normal eye - and then it rolled right over, pointing into the back of the man's head, so that all they could see was whiteness.

The stranger reached Dumbledore. He stretched out a hand that was as badly scarred as his face, and Dumbhedore shook it, muttering words I couldn't hear. He seemed to be making some inquiry of the stranger, who shook his head unsmilingly and replied in an undertone. Dumbledore nodded and gestured the man to the empty seat on his right-hand side.

The stranger sat down, shook his mane of dark gray hair out of his face, pulled a plate of sausages toward him, raised it to what was left of his nose, and sniffed it. He then took a small knife out of his pocket, speared a sausage on the end of it, and began to eat. His normal eye was fixed upon the sausages, but the blue eye was still darting restlessly around in its socket, taking in the Hall and the students.

"May I introduce our new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher?" said Dumbledore brightly into the silence. "Professor Moody."

It was usual for new staff members to be greeted with applause, but none of the staff or students chapped except Dumbledore and Hagrid, who both put their hands together and applauded, but the sound echoed dismally into the silence, and they stopped fairly quickly. Everyone else seemed too transfixed by Moody's bizarre appearance to do more than stare at him.

"Moody?" Harry muttered to us. "Mad-Eye Moody? The one your dad went to help this morning?"

"Must be," said Ron in a low, awed voice.

"What happened to him?" Hermione whispered. "What happened to his face?"

"Dunno," Ron whispered back, watching Moody with fascination.

Moody seemed totally indifferent to his less-than-warm welcome. Ignoring the jug of pumpkin juice in front of him, he reached again into his traveling cloak, pulled out a hip flask, and took a long draught from it. As he lifted his arm to drink, his cloak was pulled a few inches from the ground, and I saw, below the table, several inches of carved wooden leg, ending in a clawed foot.

Dumbledore cleared his throat.

"As I was saying," he said, smiling at the sea of students before him, all of whom were still gazing transfixed at Mad-Eye Moody, "we are to have the honor of hosting a very exciting event over the coming months, an event that has not been held for over a century. It is my very great pleasure to inform you that the Triwizard Tournament will be taking place at Hogwarts this year."

"You're JOKING!" said Fred Weasley loudly.

The tension that had filled the Hall ever since Moody's arrival suddenly broke. Nearly everyone laughed, and Dumbledore chuckled appreciatively.

"I am not joking, Mr. Weasley," he said, "though now that you mention it, I did hear an excellent one over the summer about a troll, a hag, and a leprechaun who all go into a bar."

Professor McGonagall cleared her throat loudly.

"Er - but maybe this is not the time… no…" said Dumbledore, "where was I? Ah yes, the Triwizard Tournament… well, some of you will not know what this tournament involves, so I hope those who do know will forgive me for giving a short explanation, and allow their attention to wander freely."

"The Triwizard Tournament was first established some seven hundred years ago as a friendly competition between the three largest European schools of wizardry: Hogwarts, Beauxbatons, and Durmstrang. A champion was selected to represent each school, and the three champions competed in three magical tasks. The schools took it in turns to host the tournament once every five years, and it was generally agreed to be a most excellent way of establishing ties between young witches and wizards of different nationalities - until, that is, the death toll mounted so high that the tournament was discontinued."

"Death toll?" Hermione whispered, looking alarmed. But her anxiety did not seem to be shared by the majority of students in the Hall; many of them were whispering excitedly to one another, and I myself was far more interested in hearing about the tournament than in worrying about deaths that had happened hundreds of years ago.

"There have been several attempts over the centuries to reinstate the tournament," Dumbledore continued, "none of which has been very successful. However, our own departments of International Magical Cooperation and Magical Games and Sports have decided the time is ripe for another attempt. We have worked hard over the summer to ensure that this time, no champion will find himself or herself in mortal danger."

"The heads of Beauxbatons and Durmstrang will be arriving with their short-listed contenders in October, and the selection of the three champions will take place at Halloween. An impartial judge will decide which students are most worthy to compete for the Triwizard Cup, the glory of their school, and a thousand Galleons personal prize money."

"I'm going for it!" Fred Weasley hissed down the table, his face lit with enthusiasm at the prospect of such glory and riches. He was not the only person who seemed to be visualizing himself as the Hogwarts champion. At every House table, I could see people either gazing raptly at Dumbledore, or else whispering fervently to their neighbors. But then Dumbledore spoke again, and the Hall quieted once more.

"Eager though I know all of you will be to bring the Triwizard Cup to Hogwarts," he said, "the heads of the participating schools, along with the Ministry of Magic, have agreed to impose an age restriction on contenders this year. Only students who are of age - that is to say, seventeen years or older - will be allowed to put forward their names for consideration.

This" — Dumbledore raised his voice slightly, for several people had made noises of outrage at these words, and the Weasley twins were suddenly looking furious - "is a measure we feel is necessary, given that the tournament tasks will still be difficult and dangerous, whatever precautions we take, and it is highly unlikely that students below sixth and seventh year will be able to cope with them. I will personally be ensuring that no underage student hoodwinks our impartial judge into making them Hogwarts champion." His light blue eyes twinkled as they flickered over Fred's and George's mutinous faces. "I therefore beg you not to waste your time submitting yourself if you are under seventeen."

"The delegations from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang will be arriving in October and remaining with us for the greater part of this year. I know that you will all extend every courtesy to our foreign guests while they are with us, and will give your whole-hearted support to the Hogwarts champion when he or she is selected. And now, it is late, and I know how important it is to you all to be alert and rested as you enter your lessons tomorrow morning. Bedtime! Chop chop!"

Dumbledore sat down again and turned to talk to Mad-Eye Moody. There was a great scraping and banging as all the students got to their feet and swarmed toward the double doors into the entrance hall.

"They can't do that!" said George Weasley, who had not joined the crowd moving toward the door, but was standing up and glaring at Dumbledore. "We're seventeen in April, why can't we have a shot?"

"They're not stopping me entering," said Fred stubbornly, also scowling at the top table. "The champions'll get to do all sorts of stuff you'd never be allowed to do normally. And a thousand Galleons prize money!"

"Yeah," said Ron, a faraway look on his face. "Yeah, a thousand Galleons…"

"Come on," said Hermione, "we'll be the only ones left here if you don't move."

Harry, Ron and Hermione left for the entrance hall.

I left the hall with Lavender and Parvati, who were trying to remember the Divination sign for misery. I had absolutely no idea about what they were talking about, but I still joined in at parts, they weren't exactly my friends, but they were nice people when they shut up about Divination and girly things. I hung around with them when I couldn't hang around with Sybil and Rose, they knew though, that I wasn't too close with them, they didn't seem to mind, to be honest. Sybil and Rose were friends with Parvati's twin sister who was in Ravenclaw, he name was Padma Patil, she was more brainy than her sister, but I suppose there was courage beneath that Divination, girly-girl Parvati was shown to be.

As we walked into the Gryffindor common room, Parvati and Lavender went straight up to bed, while I went to sit down by the fire and read my book called: _The Truth and Lies of a Vampire_. I didn't know why I took an interest in it, it was all about vampires and their urges, it was surprisingly good, though. I found it in one of the bookshelves at home. I loved reading, it was a way to expand my knowledge.

"Hey," said a boy's voice.

"Hey," I replied, looking up from my book.

A boy and a girl joined him by the fire. They were Ron and Hermione, I gave them both a smile, but being my shy self, that was all I could manage.

"Oh – um – Harry, Ron, this is Faye Tonks," Hermione introduced. "And Faye this is Harry Potter and Ron Weasley."

"Haven't I seen you before?" said Ron.

"We're in the same year, I do believe," I replied, I bit offended, I will admit. I was in his class for three years and he hadn't bothered to learn my name. I was shocked at the way my shyness drifted away for long enough to let me get a tad bit angry. I calmed myself down and smiled at them again.

"Oh, yeah – um – hi," said Ron, looking red. "Are you by any chance related to Nymphadora Tonks, the auror?"

"Yeah, she's my sister."

"Wicked! Can you do that thing with your hair that she can?" he asked, beaming.

"If you mean change my hair colour at will then I can do that."

"Wow! Can you show us?"

"Alright."

I decided on the colour red, I felt that being surrounded by so much red, I should contribute. I was never sure if I did it, whenever I did it at will, there was a fifty-fifty chance that I'd get it wrong.

Harry, Ron and Hermione were looking at me with their mouths wide open.

"How did you -?" said Hermione in confusement.

"It's an ability I was born with," I said while turning my hair colour back to its regular shade of black. "I'm a metamorphmagus."

"A what?" said Harry.

"It's a person who's born with the ability to change their appearance at will or by the will of their emotions. It's incredibly rare, it's genetic but can also just randomly be gifted to wizards who have metamorphmagus parent."

"Neither of my parents are metamorphmagi, just me and my sister."

I yawned and stretched out my arms.

"I better be getting to bed. I'll leave you three to whatever you planned to discuss."

I smiled and went up to my dormitory. I saw Parvati and Lavender already asleep in their beds. I went into the bathroom and brought my pyjamas and a towel with me. I took off my clothes and stepped into the shower. I washed my hair and body before getting out and drying up. I got dressed and used a drying spell for my hair. I entered back into the girl's dormitory and looked over at Hermione's empty bed, she still hadn't gotten up. I got into bed and slid under the covers before quickly falling asleep.

I was back home.

**I edited it because I didn't want Faye and Malfoy to be cousins. I want Malfoy to fancy Faye, and I don't think it's right if they're cousins. So Narcissa wasn't a Black, and Bellatrix is Andromeda's sister. Narcissa and Bellatrix are not sisters, but really good friends. This is quite important, it will be announced later why. Hope you like the story J**


	2. Classes

I was examining my course schedule in the morning. We were outside all morning, that wasn't bad. We had Herbology with the Hufflepuffs, Care of Magical Creatures with the Slytherins, Double Divination in the afternoon. Harry was complaining about it beside me. I decided I'd go back to being extremely quiet, despite the introductory last night. I eat my porridge silently, while everyone was comparing their schedules.

"What do you have, Faye?" asked Harry. I jumped up and spilled some porridge on my skirt. "Oh, sorry," he laughed.

"It's alright," I said. "And I think I have the same as you."

"Cool, do you like Care of Magical Creatures?"

"Yeah, it's better than Divination anyway."

"I couldn't agree more," chimed Hermione.

"I better be going, porridge isn't the easiest stain to wash off."

"We'll see you at Herbology," said Hermione.

"See you," said Harry.

I ran out of the Great Hall, covering my skirt with my bag and racing through the corridors until I got to the second floor girl's lavatory. I dabbed my skirt with some wet toilet paper. The stain was gone, but my skirt was wet.

"Oh yeah," I murmured to myself. "I forgot, I'm a witch."

I took out my wand and whispered a spell. Someone came out of one of the cubicles.

"Faye!" she shouted.

"Hey Sybil," I said.

"How's your first day?" she asked.

"Alright, yours?"

"Amazing! Cedric Diggory asked me out!" she shouted loudly. It was like she wanted the whole school to hear, no, it was _definite _she wanted the whole school to hear.

"That's great!"

"I need to go now Faye, potions."

"See you later then," I said.

"See you."

She skipped out of the lavatory to potions. I grabbed my bag and headed off to Herbology and took a seat beside Neville Longbottom. He was really nice, and we were great friends, but his best subject was Herbology, and I liked to use that to my advantage. Evil Faye, evil!

Professor Sprout was showing us the most disgusting creatures I had ever seen. Indeed, they looked less like plants than thick, black, giant slugs, protruding vertically out of the soil. Each was squirming slightly and had a number of large, shiny swellings upon it, which appeared to be full of liquid.

"Bubotubers," Professor Sprout told them briskly. "They need squeezing. You will collect the pus -"

"The what?" said Seamus Finnigan, sounding revolted.

"Pus, Finnigan, pus," said Professor Sprout, "and it's extremely valuable, so don't waste it. You will collect the pus, I say, in these bottles. Wear your dragon-hide gloves; it can do funny things to the skin when undiluted, bubotuber pus."

Squeezing the bubotubers was disgusting, but oddly satisfying. As each swelling was popped, a large amount of thick yellowish-green liquid burst forth, which smelled strongly of petrol. They caught it in the bottles as Professor Sprout had indicated, and by the end of the lesson had collected several pints. "This'll keep Madam Pomfrey happy," said Professor Sprout, stoppering the last bottle with a cork. "An excellent remedy for the more stubborn forms of acne, bubotuber pus. Should stop students resorting to desperate measures to rid themselves of pimples."

"Like poor Eloise Midgen," said Hannah Abbott, a Hufflepuff, in a hushed voice. "She tried to curse hers off."

"Silly girl," said Professor Sprout, shaking her head. "But Madam Pomfrey fixed her nose back on in the end."

A booming bell echoed from the castle across the wet grounds, signaling the end of the lesson, and the class separated; the Hufflepuffs climbing the stone steps for Transfiguration, and the Gryffindors heading in the other direction, down the sloping lawn toward Hagrid's small wooden cabin, which stood on the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

Hagrid was standing outside his hut, one hand on the collar of his enormous black boarhound, Fang. There were several open wooden crates on the ground at his feet, and Fang was whimpering and straining at his collar, apparently keen to investigate the contents more closely. As we drew nearer, an odd rattling noise reached our ears, punctuated by what sounded like minor explosions.

"Mornin'!" Hagrid said, grinning at Harry, Ron, Hermione and me. "Be'er wait fer the Slytherins, they won' want ter miss this - Blast-Ended Skrewts!"

"Come again?" said Ron.

Hagrid pointed down into the crates.

"Eurgh!" squealed Lavender Brown, jumping backward. "Eurgh" just about summed up the Blast-Ended Skrewts in my opinion. They looked like deformed, shell-less lobsters, horribly pale and slimy-looking, with legs sticking out in very odd places and no visible heads. There were about a hundred of them in each crate, each about six inches long, crawling over one aother, bumping blindly into the sides of the boxes. They were giving off a very powerful smell of rotting fish. Every now and then, sparks would fly out of the end of a skrewt, and with a small phut, it would be propelled forward several inches.

"On'y jus' hatched," said Hagrid proudly, "so yeh'll be able ter raise 'em yerselves! Thought we'd make a bit of a project of it!"

"And why would we want to raise them?" said a cold voice.

The Slytherins had arrived. The speaker was Draco Malfoy. Crabbe and Goyle were chuckling appreciatively at his words.

Hagrid looked stumped at the question.

"I mean, what do they do?" asked Malfoy. "What is the point of them?"

"I suppose if you'd actually listen, you'd find out!" I snapped.

Everybody looked at me, as if just realising I actually existed. Hagrid gave me a thankful smile, and I smiled back. Harry smiled brightly at me, Ron looked like I told him I was the Queen of England and Hermione looked at me like I told her I was quitting school. Lavender and Parvati were too busy talking about Divination to realise someone had spoken. Malfoy just glared at me with hatred in his eyes. I must admit, I was more than shocked that I actually opened my mouth during a lesson; I usually just stand there and listen.

"Tha's next lesson, Malfoy. Yer jus' feedin' 'em today. Now, yeh'll wan' ter try 'em on a few diff'rent things - I've never had 'em before, not sure what they'll go fer - I got ant eggs an' frog livers an' a bit o' grass snake - just try 'em out with a bit of each."

"First pus and now this," muttered Seamus.

Nothing but deep affection for Hagrid could have made Harry, Ron, and Hermione pick up squelchy handfuls of frog liver and lower them into the crates to tempt the Blast-Ended Skrewts. I just did it because it was a lesson, no way in hell was I ever going to do this on free will! I couldn't suppress the suspicion that the whole thing was entirely pointless, because the skrewts didn't seem to have mouths.

"Ouch!" yelled Dean Thomas after about ten minutes. "It got me."

Hagrid hurried over to him, looking anxious.

"It's end exploded!" said Dean angrily, showing Hagrid a burn on his hand.

"Ah, yeah, that can happen when they blast off," said Hagrid, nodding.

"Eurgh!" said Lavender Brown again. "Eurgh, Hagrid, what's that pointy thing on it?"

"Ah, some of 'em have got stings," said Hagrid enthusiastically (Lavender quickly withdrew her hand from the box). "I reckon they're the males… The females've got sorta sucker things on their bellies… I think they might be ter suck blood."

"Well, I can certainly see why we're trying to keep them alive," said Malfoy sarcastically. "Who wouldn't want pets that can burn, sting, and bite all at once?"

"Just because they're not very pretty, it doesn't mean they're not useful," Hermione snapped. "Dragon blood's amazingly magical, but you wouldn't want a dragon for a pet, would you?"

Harry and Ron grinned at Hagrid, who gave them a furtive smile from behind his bushy beard and I smirked at Malfoy. Take that! Hagrid simply loved monstrous creatures, the more lethal, the better.

"There disgusting!" shouted Lavender. "And they sting! Ew!"

"If you just shut up then maybe they'll treat you nicer!" shouted Hermione

Lavender and Parvati scowled at her, while I sniggered. I mouthed a 'thank you' to Hermione and she smiled warmly. The rest of the lesson was filled with Lavender and Parvati talking about stupid Divination and girly stuff which I tried to block out. I hated girly stuff. I never wore skirts or dresses apart from my school uniform, but that was just because it was obligatory.

I caught up with Sybil and Rose in the Great Hall for lunch. I could only chat with them for a few minutes because I needed to get back to the Gryffindor table.

"So what've you been doing?" asked Sybil.

"Herbology and Care of Magical Creatures. We have double Divination after lunch. Ugh, Trelawny's a crack-pot, surprised they still have her here," I answered.

"That's why we rely on facts," said Rose. "Why do you do Divination if you hate it?"

"Because it's easy!"

Rose and Sybil rolled their eyes playfully.

"S'pose," said Sybil. "Arithmacy is brilliant though."

"Yeah," I replied. "I gotta go for lunch, see ya later Sybil, Rose."

"Bye Faye."

I walked over to the Gryffindor table and munched on a sandwich. Hermione was stuffing her face with food.

"Er - is this the new stand on elf rights?" said Ron. "You're going to make yourself puke instead?"

"No," said Hermione, with as much dignity as she could muster with her mouth bulging with sprouts. "I just want to get to the library."

"What?" said Ron in disbelief. "Hermione - it's the first day back! We haven't even got homework yet!"

Hermione shrugged and continued to shovel down her food as though she had not eaten for days. Then she leapt to her feet, said, "See you at dinner!" and departed at high speed.

"Faye," said Harry, turning his head towards me.

"Yes," I replied, my mouth still full of a bacon sandwich. I quickly swallowed it so I could talk.

"What do you think about elf-rights?" he asked.

"You mean house-elves?"

"Yeah."

"They clearly like being enslaved, but they are being brainwashed. Why?"

"Just wondering. Hermione is getting obsessed on the subject," said Harry.

"She wants to free them!" joked Ron.

"They should have the choice though. They're treated kindly hear at Hogwarts, but in some places they're terrible to their house-elves."

"Like the Malfoys," Harry murmured.

"Precisely," I added. "I have to go, I don't want to be late for Divination. Trelawney might predict my death as punishment!"

"See ya," said Harry and Ron in unison.

I walked out of the Great Hall and ran up the stairs to Divination. I felt footsteps behind me, three boys were sniggering. I turned around and saw a boy with a pale face and white-blonde hair. Malfoy with his goons.

"Hey Tonks," he sniggered. "How's that mudblood father of yours?"

I continued walking and ignoring him. I felt his anger through his silence.

"No one, and I mean no one, ignores me!" he shouted spitefully.

"It's too bad I did. And as far as I know, you don't take Divination," I stated, continuing walking.

"I don't, we're on our way to Transfiguration, but I thought I'd have a nice chat with my dear cousin!"

The goons laughed and I just ignored him. I proceeded to go to Divination, and Malfoy and co. decided to leave me when they realised they weren't getting anywhere. I held my books close as I strolled to Divination.

"Hey!" said a familiar voice. I jumped at the interruption of my thoughts.

"Geez Parvati! You scared me!"

"Sorry, we're _so _excited!" said Parvati.

"No kidding," I joked.

"I've been practising _all _summer!" said Lavender joyfully.

"Me too!" chimed Parvati. "I _love _ Divination, you know what happens, before it happens!"

"That's the point," I said under my breath.

We walked into the classroom to see Trelawney looking into a glass ball. She looked worried. Parvati and Lavender shrieked.

"What do you think she sees?" asked Lavender.

"Something bad!" said Parvati.

I wanted to insult their stupidity, but I cared about them too much to insult them. I saw Harry and Ron sitting together at a table by themselves, chatting. I decided to sit beside them. I made my way over to their table.

"Aren't you going to sit with us?" asked Lavender, a little hurt.

"I'll sit with you next lesson. I need to ask Harry something."

The truth was I wanted to get away from them. I couldn't say that to them though, for obvious reasons.

"May I join you?" I asked.

"Sure," said Harry.

I put my bag under the table and relaxed into one of the chairs.

"Don't get me wrong, Faye, you're a fine girl, but why aren't you sitting with Parvati and Lavender, they're your friends right?" asked Ron.

"They get a bit – er – mad, when it comes to Divination, they're kind of – well – obsessed about the subject. I suppose I need a break, they're nice people and all, but they're driving me mental!" I whispered, to make sure they didn't hear me.

"It's fine," said Harry warmly. "You can always sit with us."

I smiled warmly and took my Divination books out of my bags.

"You don't like Divination then?" asked Ron.

"No! I hate it, I'm just taking it because it's easy," I admitted.

"Same here," said Ron.

**A/N: So there's another chapter. Not as long as the previous chapter, but it's fairly long. Ah sure, it'll do. I've been going on books, but I think I might change to the movies soon, maybe not in the next chapter, or the one after that, but sometime. Thank you for reading, please favourite, follow and/or review! It's a pleasure to hear your thoughts. Thanks to BlueGreen216 for reviewing and to those of you who followed/favourite. I might change POVs through the story, probably will. Thank you for reading! :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry about the kind of late update, school and all L. I'm going to do a Harry POV later, and I might stick with the books for a little while longer. Please favourite, follow and/or review. Thanks.**

"Good day," said the misty voice of Professor Trelawney right behind Harry, making him jump.

A very thin woman with enormous glasses that made her eyes appear far too large for her face, Professor Trelawney was peering down at Harry with the tragic expression she always wore whenever she saw him. The usual large amount of beads, chains, and bangles glittered upon her person in the firelight.

"You are preoccupied, my dear," she said mournfully to Harry. "My inner eye sees past your brave face to the troubled soul within. And I regret to say that your worries are not baseless. I see difficult times ahead for you, alas… most difficult… I fear the thing you dread will indeed come to pass… and perhaps sooner than you think…"

Her voice dropped almost to a whisper. Ron rolled his eyes at Harry, who looked stonily back. Professor Trelawney swept past us and seated herself in a large winged armchair before the fire, facing the class. Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil, who deeply admired Professor Trelawney, were sitting on poufs very close to her.

"My dears, it is time for us to consider the stars," she said. "The movements of the planets and the mysterious portents they reveal only to those who understand the steps of the celestial dance. Human destiny may be deciphered by the planetary rays, which intermingle…"

Argh why did I bother with this class! It's so boring, nothing excited ever happened. It's always the same. I know how to read the stars and planets, uncle Moony told me a bit. Suddenly Professor Trelawney said Harry's name and I shook my head clear

"Harry!" Ron muttered.

"What?" he asked.

Harry looked around; the whole class was staring at him. He sat up straight; looked like he almost dozed off.

"I was saying, my dear, that you were clearly born under the baleful influence of Saturn," said Professor Trelawney, a faint note of resentment in her voice at the fact that he had obviously not been hanging on her words.

"Born under - what, sorry?" said Harry.

"Saturn, dear, the planet Saturn!" said Professor Trelawney, sounding definitely irritated that he wasn't riveted by this news. "I was saying that Saturn was surely in a position of power in the heavens at the moment of your birth… Your dark hair… your mean stature… tragic losses so young in life… I think I am right in saying, my dear, that you were born in midwinter?"

"No," said Harry, "I was born in July."

Ron hastily turned his laugh into a hacking cough. I didn't, I just smiled.

Half an hour later, each of us had been given a complicated circular chart, and was attempting to fill in the position of the planets at our moment of birth. It was dull work, requiring much consultation of timetables and calculation of angles.

"I've got two Neptunes here," said Harry after a while, frowning down at his piece of parchment, "that can't be right, can it?"

"Aaaaah," said Ron, imitating Professor Trelawney's mystical whisper, "when two Neptunes appear in the sky, it is a sure sign that a midget in glasses is being born, Harry…"

Seamus and Dean, who were working nearby, sniggered loudly, though not loudly enough to mask the excited squeals from Lavender Brown - "Oh Professor, look! I think I've got an unaspected planet! Oooh, which one's that, Professor?"

"It is Uranus, my dear," said Professor Trelawney, peering down at the chart.

"Can I have a look at Uranus too, Lavender?" said Ron.

"Oh Ron!" I snapped. "Don't be so immature!"

He gave me a surprised look like he just remembered I was there.

Most unfortunately, Professor Trelawney heard him, and it was this, perhaps, that made her give them so much homework at the end of the class.

"A detailed analysis of the way the planetary movements in the coming month will affect you, with reference to your personal chart," she snapped, sounding much more like Professor McGonagall than her usual airy-fairy self. "I want it ready to hand in next Monday, and no excuses!"

"You want to join us for dinner?" asked Harry.

"What? Oh- sure," I answered.

"Miserable old bat," said Ron bitterly as we joined the crowds descending the staircases back to the Great Hall and dinner. "That'll take all weekend, that will…"

"Lots of homework?" said Hermione brightly, catching up with us. "Professor Vector didn't give us any at all!"

"Well, bully for Professor Vector," said Ron moodily.

We reached the entrance hall, which was packed with people queuing for dinner. we had just joined the end of the line, when a loud voice rang out behind us.

"Weasley! Hey, Weasley!"

Harry, Ron, Hermione and me turned. Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle were standing there, each looking thoroughly pleased about something.

"What?" said Ron shortly.

"Your dad's in the paper, Weasley!" said Malfoy, brandishing a copy of the Daily Prophet and speaking very loudly, so that everyone in the packed entrance hall could hear. "Listen to this!"

**FURTHER MISTAKES AT THE MINISTRY OF MAGIC**

It seems as though the Ministry of Magic's troubles are not yet at an end, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. Recently under fire for its poor crowd control at the Quidditch World Cup, and still unable to account for the disappearance of one of its witches, the Ministry was plunged into fresh embarrassment yesterday by the antics of Arnold Weasley, of the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office."

Malfoy looked up.

"Imagine them not even getting his name right, Weasley. It's almost as though he's a complete nonentity, isn't it?" he crowed.

Everyone in the entrance hall was listening now. Malfoy straightened the paper with a flourish and read on:

Arnold Weasley, who was charged with possession of a flying car two years ago, was yesterday involved in a tussle with several Muggle law-keepers ("policemen") over a number of highly aggressive dustbins. Mr. Weasley appears to have rushed to the aid of "Mad-Eye" Moody, the aged ex-Auror who retired from the Ministry when no longer able to tell the difference between a handshake and attempted murder. Unsurprisingly, Mr. Weasley found, upon arrival at Mr. Moody's heavily guarded house, that Mr. Moody had once again raised a false alarm. Mr. Weasley was forced to modify several memories before he could escape from the policemen, but refused to answer Daily Prophet questions about why he had involved the Ministry in such an undignified and potentially embarrassing scene.

"And there's a picture, Weasley!" said Malfoy, flipping the paper over and holding it up. "A picture of your parents outside their house - if you can call it a house! Your mother could do with losing a bit of weight, couldn't she?"

Ron was shaking with fury. Everyone was staring at him.

"Get stuffed, Malfoy," said Harry. "C'mon, Ron…"

"Oh yeah, you were staying with them this summer, weren't you, Potter?" sneered Malfoy. "So tell me, is his mother really that porky, or is it just the picture?"

"You know your mother, Malfoy?" said Harry - both he and Hermione had grabbed the back of Ron's robes to stop him from launching himself at Malfoy, I had walked in front of him and placed both hands on his chest to hold him there –

"that expression she's got, like she's got dung under her nose? Has she always looked like that, or was it just because you were with her?"

Malfoy's pale face went slightly pink.

"Don't you dare insult my mother, Potter."

"Keep your fat mouth shut, then," said Harry, turning away.

BANG!

Several people screamed - Something white-hot graze the side of Harry's face - I plunged my hand into my robes for my wand, but before I'd even touched it, I heard a second loud BANG, and a roar that echoed through the entrance hall.

"OH NO YOU DON'T, LADDIE!"

I spun around. Professor Moody was limping down the marble staircase. His wand was out and it was pointing right at a pure white ferret, which was shivering on the stone-flagged floor, exactly where Malfoy had been standing.

There was a terrified silence in the entrance hall. Nobody but Moody was moving a muscle. Moody turned to look at Harry — at least, his normal eye was looking at Harry; the other one was pointing into the back of his head.

"Did he get you?" Moody growled. His voice was low and gravelly.

"No," said Harry, "missed."

"LEAVE IT!" Moody shouted.

"Leave - what?" Harry said, bewildered.

"Not you - him!" Moody growled, jerking his thumb over his shoulder at Crabbe, who had just frozen, about to pick up the white ferret. It seemed that Moody's rolling eye was magical and could see out of the back of his head.

Moody started to limp toward Crabbe, Goyle, and the ferret, which gave a terrified squeak and took off, streaking toward the dungeons.

"I don't think so!" roared Moody, pointing his wand at the ferret again - it flew ten feet into the air, fell with a smack to the floor, and then bounced upward once more.

"I don't like people who attack when their opponent's back's turned," growled Moody as the ferret bounced higher and higher, squealing in pain.

"Stinking, cowardly, scummy thing to do…"

The ferret flew through the air, its legs and tail flailing helplessly. "Never - do - that - again -" said Moody, speaking each word as the ferret hit the stone floor and bounced upward again.

"Professor Moody!" said a shocked voice.

Professor McGonagall was coming down the marble staircase with her arms full of books.

"Hello, Professor McGonagall," said Moody calmly, bouncing the ferret still higher.

"What - what are you doing?" said Professor McGonagall, her eyes following the bouncing ferret's progress through the air.

"Teaching," said Moody.

"Teach - Moody, is that a student?" shrieked Professor McGonagall, the books spilling out of her arms.

"Yep," said Moody.

"No!" cried Professor McGonagall, running down the stairs and pulling out her wand; a moment later, with a loud snapping noise, Draco Malfoy had reappeared, lying in a heap on the floor with his sleek blond hair all over his now brilliantly pink face. He got to his feet, wincing.

"Moody, we never use Transfiguration as a punishment!" said Professor McGonagall wealdy. "Surely Professor Dumbledore told you that?"

"He might've mentioned it, yeah," said Moody, scratching his chin unconcernedly, "but I thought a good sharp shock -"

"We give detentions, Moody! Or speak to the offender's Head of House!"

"I'll do that, then," said Moody, staring at Malfoy with great dislike.

Malfoy, whose pale eyes were still watering with pain and humiliation, looked malevolently up at Moody and muttered something in which the words "my father" were distinguishable.

"Oh yeah?" said Moody quietly, limping forward a few steps, the dull clunk of his wooden leg echoing around the hall. "Well, I know your father of old, boy… You tell him Moody's keeping a close eye on his son… you tell him that from me… Now, your Head of House'll be Snape, will it?"

"Yes," said Malfoy resentfully.

"Another old friend," growled Moody. "I've been looking forward to a chat with old Snape… Come on, you…"

And he seized Malfoy's upper arm and marched him off toward the dungeons.

Professor McGonagall stared anxiously after them for a few moments, then waved her wand at her fallen books, causing them to soar up into the air and back into her arms.

"Don't talk to me," Ron said quietly to Harry, Hermione and me as we sat down at the Gryffindor table a few minutes later, surrounded by excited talk on all sides about what had just happened.

"Why not?" said Hermione in surprise.

"Because I want to fix that in my memory forever," said Ron, his eyes closed and an uplifted expression on his face. "Draco Malfoy, the amazing bouncing ferret."

Harry, Hermione and me laughed, and Hermione began doling beef casserole onto each of their plates. I went for Salmon.

"He could have really hurt Malfoy, though," she said. "It was good, really, that Professor McGonagall stopped it -"

"Hermione!" said Ron furiously, his eyes snapping open again, "you're ruining the best moment of my life!"

Hermione made an impatient noise.

"Hermione is right, Ron. He's still human, he could have seriously hurt himself. He could have a trauma." I said.

Hermione smiled at me and began to eat at top speed again.

"Don't tell me you're going back to the library this evening?" said Harry, watching her.

"Got to," said Hermione thickly. "Loads to do."

"But you told us Professor Vector -"

"It's not schoolwork," she said. Within five minutes, she had cleared her plate and departed. No sooner had she gone than her seat was taken by Fred Weasley.

"Moody!" he said. "How cool is he?"

"Beyond cool," said George, sitting down opposite Fred. "Supercool," said the twins' best friend, Lee Jordan, sliding into the seat beside George. "We had him this afternoon," he told Harry, Ron and me.

"What was it like?" said Harry eagerly.

Fred, George, and Lee exchanged looks full of meaning.

"Never had a lesson like it," said Fred.

"He knows, man," said Lee.

"Knows what?" said Ron, leaning forward.

"Knows what it's like to be out there doing it," said George impressively.

"Doing what?" said Harry.

"Fighting the Dark Arts," said Fred.

"He's seen it all," said George.

"Mazing," said Lee.

Ron dived into his bag for his schedule.

"We haven't got him till Thursday!" he said in a disappointed voice.

"You'll live!" I said smiling.

I grabbed a chicken leg from one of the plates and munched on it. I loved chicken, I could eat a whole plate full.

"So what do you think Hermione's doin'?" asked Ron.

"No idea," said Harry.


	4. Chapter 4

The Gryffindor fourth years were looking forward to Moody's first lesson so much that they arrived early on Thursday lunchtime and queued up outside his classroom before the bell had even rung. The only person missing was Hermione, who turned up just in time for the lesson.

"Been in the -"

"Library." Harry finished her sentence for her. "C'mon, quick, or we won't get decent seats."

We hurried into four chairs right in front of the teacher's desk, took out our copies of The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection, and waited, unusually quiet. Soon we heard Moody's distinctive clunking footsteps coming down the corridor, and he entered the room, looking as strange and frightening as ever. We could just see his clawed, wooden foot protruding from underneath his robes.

"You can put those away," he growled, stumping over to his desk and sitting down, "those books. You won't need them."

We returned the books to our bags, Ron looking excited.

Moody took out a register, shook his long mane of grizzled gray hair out of his twisted and scarred face, and began to call out names, his normal eye moving steadily down the list while his magical eye swiveled around, fixing upon each student as he or she answered.

"Right then," he said, when the last person had declared themselves present, "I've had a letter from Professor Lupin about this class. Seems you've had a pretty thorough grounding in tackling Dark creatures - you've covered boggarts, Red Caps, hinkypunks, grindylows, Kappas, and werewolves, is that right?"

There was a general murmur of assent.

"But you're behind - very behind - on dealing with curses," said Moody. "So I'm here to bring you up to scratch on what wizards can do to each other. I've got one year to teach you how to deal with Dark -"

"What, aren't you staying?" Ron blurted out.

Moody's magical eye spun around to stare at Ron; Ron looked extremely apprehensive, but after a moment Moody smiled - the first time I had seen him do so. The effect was to make his heavily scarred face look more twisted and contorted than ever, but it was nevertheless good to know that he ever did anything as friendly as smile.

Ron looked deeply relieved.

"You'll be Arthur Weasley's son, eh?" Moody said. "Your father got me out of a very tight corner a few days ago… Yeah, I'm staying just the one year. Special favor to Dumbledore… One year, and then back to my quiet retirement." He gave a harsh laugh, and then clapped his gnarled hands together.

"So - straight into it. Curses. They come in many strengths and forms. Now, according to the Ministry of Magic, I'm supposed to teach you countercurses and leave it at that. I'm not supposed to show you what illegal Dark curses look like until you're in the sixth year. You're not supposed to be old enough to deal with it till then. But Professor Dumbledore's got a higher opinion of your nerves, he reckons you can cope, and I say, the sooner you know what you're up against, the better. How are you supposed to defend yourself against something you've never seen? A wizard who's about to put an illegal curse on you isn't going to tell you what he's about to do. He's not going to do it nice and polite to your face. You need to be prepared. You need to be alert and watchful. You need to put that away, Miss Brown, when I'm talking."

Lavender jumped and blushed. She had been showing Parvati her completed horoscope under the desk. Apparently Moody's magical eye could see through solid wood, as well as out of the back of his head.

"So… do any of you know which curses are most heavily punished by wizarding law?"

Several hands rose tentatively into the air, including Ron's, Hermione's and mine.

Moody pointed at Ron, though his magical eye was still fixed on Lavender.

"Er," said Ron tentatively, "my dad told me about one… Is it called the Imperius Curse, or something?"

"Ah, yes," said Moody appreciatively. "Your father would know that one. Gave the Ministry a lot of trouble at one time, the Imperius Curse."

Moody got heavily to his mismatched feet, opened his desk drawer, and took out a glass jar. Three large black spiders were scuttling around inside it.

I could see Ron move out of the corner of my eye - Ron hated spiders. Moody reached into the jar, caught one of the spiders, and held it in the palm of his hand so that they could all see it. He then pointed his wand at it and muttered, "Imperio!"

The spider leapt from Moody's hand on a fine thread of silk and began to swing backward and forward as though on a trapeze. It stretched out its legs rigidly, then did a back flip, breaking the thread and landing on the desk, where it began to cartwheel in circles. Moody jerked his wand, and the spider rose onto two of its hind legs and went into what was unmistakably a tap dance.

Everyone was laughing - everyone except Moody and me. I know what that curse can do when you are not as friendly like Moody is now.

"Think it's funny, do you?" he growled. "You'd like it, would you, if I did it to you?"

The laughter died away almost instantly.

"Total control," said Moody quietly as the spider balled itself up and began to roll over and over. "I could make it jump out of the window, drown itself, throw itself down one of your throats…"

Ron gave an involuntary shudder.

"Years back, there were a lot of witches and wizards being controlled by the Imperius Curse," said Moody, and I knew he was talking about the days in which Voldemort had been all-powerful. "Some job for the Ministry, trying to sort out who was being forced to act, and who was acting of their own free will."

"The Imperius Curse can be fought, and I'll be teaching you how, but it takes real strength of character, and not everyone's got it. Better avoid being hit with it if you can. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" he barked, and everyone jumped.

Moody picked up the somersaulting spider and threw it back into the jar.

"Anyone else know one? Another illegal curse?"

Hermione's hand flew into the air again and so, to my slight surprise, did Neville's. The only class in which Neville usually volunteered information was Herbology which was easily his best subject. Neville looked surprised at his own daring.

"Yes?" said Moody, his magical eye rolling right over to fix on Neville.

"There's one - the Cruciatus Curse," said Neville in a small but distinct voice.

Moody was looking very intently at Neville, this time with both eyes. What is his deal?

"Your name's Longbottom?" he said, his magical eye swooping down to check the register again.

Neville nodded nervously, but Moody made no further inquiries. Turning back to the class at large, he reached into the jar for the next spider and placed it upon the desktop, where it remained motionless, apparently too scared to move.

"The Cruciatus Curse," said Moody. "Needs to be a bit bigger for you to get the idea," he said, pointing his wand at the spider. "Engorgio!"

The spider swelled. It was now larger than a tarantula. Abandoning all pretense, Ron pushed his chair backward, as far away from Moody's desk as possible. Moody raised his wand again, pointed it at the spider, and muttered, "Crucio!"

At once, the spider's legs bent in upon its body; it rolled over and began to twitch horribly, rocking from side to side. No sound came from it, but I was sure that if it could have given voice, it would have been screaming. I couldn't look away, I wanted it to, but I couldn't. it's horrible.

Moody did not remove his wand, and the spider started to shudder and jerk more violently - "Stop it!" Hermione said shrilly.

I looked around at her. She was looking, not at the spider, but at Neville, and I, following her gaze, saw that Neville's hands were clenched upon the desk in front of him, his knuckles white, his eyes wide and horrified. Moody raised his wand. The spider's legs relaxed, but it continued to twitch.

"Reducio," Moody muttered, and the spider shrank back to its proper size. He put it back into the jar.

"Pain," said Moody softly. "You don't need thumbscrews or knives to torture someone if you can perform the Cruciatus Curse… That one was very popular once too."

"Right… anyone know any others?"

I looked around. From the looks on everyone's faces, I guessed they were all wondering what was going to happen to the last spider. Hermione's hand shook slightly as, for the third time, she raised it into the air.

"Yes?" said Moody, looking at her.

"Avada Kedavra," Hermione whispered.

Several people looked uneasily around at her, including Ron.

"Ah," said Moody, another slight smile twisting his lopsided mouth. "Yes, the last and worst. Avada Kedavra… the Killing Curse."

He put his hand into the glass jar, and almost as though it knew what was coming, the third spider scuttled frantically around the bottom of the jar, trying to evade Moody's fingers, but he trapped it, and placed it upon the desktop. It started to scuttle frantically across the wooden surface.

Moody raised his wand, and I felt uneasy. Was he really going to preform that curse? In front of us. Is he mad?

"Avada Kedavra!" Moody roared. Oh my God, he did it.

There was a flash of blinding green light and a rushing sound, as though a vast, invisible something was soaring through the air - instantaneously the spider rolled over onto its back, unmarked, but unmistakably dead. Several of the students stifled cries; Ron had thrown himself backward and almost toppled off his seat as the spider skidded toward him.

Moody swept the dead spider off the desk onto the floor.

"Not nice," he said calmly. "Not pleasant. And there's no countercurse. There's no blocking it. Only one known person has ever survived it, and he's sitting right in front of me."

Harry's face redden as Moody's eyes (both of them) looked into his. Everyone else lookied around at him too. Harry stared at the blank blackboard as though fascinated by it, but not really seeing it at all… I could read his face well and know most of the time what he's thinking.

So that was how people die, like that spider. Unblemished and unmarked. Just a flash of green light, dead coming right at you without escaping it. Life that easily wiped away from your body.

Moody was speaking again, from a great distance, it seemed to me. With a massive effort, I pulled myself back to the present and listened to what Moody was saying.

"Avada Kedavra's a curse that needs a powerful bit of magic behind it - you could all get your wands out now and point them at me and say the words, and I doubt I'd get so much as a nosebleed. But that doesn't matter. I'm not here to teach you how to do it."

"Now, if there's no countercurse, why am I showing you? Because you've got to know. You've got to appreciate what the worst is. You don't want to find yourself in a situation where you're facing it. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" he roared, and the whole class jumped again.

"Now… those three curses - Avada Kedavra, Imperius, and Cruciatus - are known as the Unforgivable Curses. The use of any one of them on a fellow human being is enough to earn a life sentence in Azkaban. That's what you're up against. That's what I've got to teach you to fight. You need preparing. You need arming. But most of all, you need to practice constant, never-ceasing vigilance. Get out your quills… copy this down…"

We spent the rest of the lesson taking notes on each of the Unforgivable Curses. No one spoke until the bell rang - but when Moody had dismissed us and we had left the classroom, a torrent of talk burst forth. Most people were discussing the curses in awed voices –

"Did you see it twitch?"

"- and when he killed it – just like that!"

They were talking about the lesson, I thought, as though it had been some sort of spectacular show, but I hadn't found it very entertaining – and nor, it seemed, had Hermione and Harry.

"Hurry up," she said tensely to Harry and Ron.

"Not the ruddy library again?" said Ron.

"No," I said curtly, pointing up a side passage. "Neville." Neville was standing alone, halfway up the passage, staring at the stone wall opposite him with the same horrified, wide-eyed look he had worn when Moody had demonstrated the Cruciatus Curse.

"Neville?" I said gently.

Neville looked around.

"Oh hello," he said, his voice much higher than usual. "Interesting lesson, wasn't it? I wonder what's for dinner, I'm – I'm starving, aren't you?"

"Neville, are you all right?" I asked.

"Oh yes, I'm fine," Neville gabbled in the same unnaturally high voice. "Very interesting dinner – I mean lesson – what's for eating?"

"Neville, I-" I started before an odd clunking noise sounded behind us. We turned to see Professor Moody limping toward us. All five of us fell silent, watching him apprehensively, but when he spoke, it was in a much lower and gentler growl than we had yet heard.

"It's all right, sonny," he said to Neville. "Why don't you come up to my office? Come on… we can have a cup of tea…"

Neville looked even more frightened at the prospect of tea with Moody. He neither moved nor spoke. Moody turned his magical eye upon Harry.

"You all right, are you, Potter?"

"Yes," said Harry.

Moody's blue eye quivered slightly in its socket as it surveyed Harry. Then he said, "You've got to know. It seems harsh, maybe, but you've got to know. No point pretending… well… come on, Longbottom, I've got some books that might interest you."

Neville looked pleadingly at Harry, Ron, Hermione and me but we didn't say anything, so Neville had no choice but to allow himself to be steered away, one of Moody's gnarled hands on his shoulder.

"What was that about?" said Ron, watching Neville and Moody turn the corner.

"I don't know," said Hermione, looking pensive.

"Some lesson, though, eh?" said Ron to us as we set off for the Great Hall. "Fred and George were right, weren't they? He really knows his stuff, Moody, doesn't he? When he did Avada Kedavra, the way that spider just died, just snuffed it right –"

"Tact, Ron, ever heard of it? God!" I said to him while hitting him on the head.

"Bloody Hell, woman, what's your …"

But Ron fell silent at the look on Harry's face and didn't speak again until we reached the Great Hall, when he said he supposed we had better make a start on Professor Trelawney's predictions tonight, since they would take hours.

Hermione did not join in with Harry's, Ron's and mine conversation during dinner, but ate furiously fast, and then left for the library again. Harry, Ron and me walked back to Gryffindor Tower, and Harry, now raised the subject of the Unforgivable Curses himself.

"Wouldn't Moody and Dumbledore be in trouble with the Ministry if they knew we'd seen the curses?" Harry asked as we approached the Fat Lady.

"Yeah, probably," said Ron. "But Dumbledore's always done things his way, hasn't he, and Moody's been getting in trouble for years, I reckon. Attacks first and asks questions later – look at his dustbins. Balderdash."

The Fat Lady swung forward to reveal the entrance hole, and we climbed into the Gryffindor common room, which was crowded and noisy.

"Shall we get our Divination stuff, then?" said Harry.

"I s'pose," Ron groaned.

They went up to the dormitory to fetch their books and charts and I went to get mine. I was back before the boys and went to sit on the table to get started already. I wasn't in the mood to do this but I had no choice. It didn't took long before the boys were back and began on their predictions for the coming month. I worked fast and soon was finished. I didn't believe anything I had written and I didn't checked it if it was right. It was only Divination.

The boys on the other hand, had some trouble. An hour later, they had made very little progress, though our table was littered with bits of parchment bearing sums and symbols.

"I haven't got a clue what this lot's supposed to mean," Harry said, staring down at a long list of calculations.

"You know," said Ron, whose hair was on end because of all the times he had run his fingers through it in frustration, "I think it's back to theold Divination standby."

"What – make it up?"

"Yeah," said Ron, sweeping the jumble of scrawled notes off the table, dipping his pen into some ink, and starting to write.

"Next Monday," he said as he scribbled, "I am likely to develop a cough, owing to the unlucky conjunction of Mars and Jupiter." He looked up at Harry. "You know her – just put in loads of misery, she'll lap it up."

"Right," said Harry, crumpling up his first attempt and lobbing it over the heads of a group of chattering first years into the fire. "Okay… on Monday, I will be in danger of- er – burns."

"Yeah, you will be," said Ron darkly, "we're seeing the skrewts again on Monday. Okay, Tuesday, I'll… erm…"

"Lose a treasured possession," said Harry, who was flicking through Unfogging the Future for ideas.

"Good one," said Ron, copying it down. "Because of… erm… Mercury. Why don't you get stabbed in the back by someone you thought was a friend?"

"Yeah… cool…" said Harry, scribbling it down, "because… Venus is in the twelfth house."

"And on Wednesday, I think I'll come off worst in a fight."

"Aaah, I was going to have a fight. Okay, I'll lose a bet."

"Yeah, you'll be betting I'll win my fight…"

They continued to make up predictions (which grew steadily more tragic) for another hour, while the common room around them slowly emptied as people went up to bed. Crookshanks wandered over to them, leapt lightly into an empty chair, and stared inscrutably at Harry and Ron, rather as Hermione might look if she knew they weren't doing their homework properly. I didn't mind, at least not with this work. I even suggested some things to them. We had a lot of fun making up different ways of dying.

Staring around the room, trying to think of a kind of misfortune they hadn't yet used, I saw Fred and George sitting together against the opposite wall, heads together, quills out, poring over a single piece of parchment. It was most unusual to see Fred and George hidden away in a corner and working silently; they usually liked to be in the thick of things and the noisy center of attention. There was something secretive about the way they were working on the piece of parchment, and I was reminded of how they had sat together writing something back at the Burrow. I had thought then that it was another order form for Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, but it didn't look like that this time; if it had been, they would surely have let Lee Jordan in on the joke. I wondered whether it had anything to do with entering the Triwizard Tournament.

As I watched, George shook his head at Fred, scratched out something with his quill, and said, in a very quiet voice that nevertheless carried across the almost deserted room, "No – that sounds like we're accusing him. Got to be careful…"

Then George looked over and saw me watching him. I grinned and quickly returned to the predictions – I didn't want George to think he was eavesdropping.

Shortly after that, the twins rolled up their parchment, said good night, and went off to bed. Fred and George had been gone ten minutes or so when the portrait hole opened and Hermione climbed into the common room carrying a sheaf of parchment in one hand and a box whose contents rattled as she walked in the other. Crookshanks arched his back, purring.

"Hello," she said, "I've just finished!"

"So have I!" said Ron triumphantly, throwing down his quill.

Hermione sat down, laid the things she was carrying in an empty armchair, and pulled Ron's predictions toward her.

"Not going to have a very good month, are you?" she said sardonically as Crookshanks curled up in her lap.

"Ah well, at least I'm forewarned," Ron yawned.

"You seem to be drowning twice," said Hermione.

"Oh am I?" said Ron, peering down at his predictions. "I'd better change one of them to getting trampled by a rampaging hippogriff."

"Don't you think it's a bit obvious you've made these up?" said Hermione.

"How dare you!" said Ron, in mock outrage. "We've been working like house-elves here!"

Feeling the commotion, I decided to leave.

"I'm going to bed. Night," I said.

I walked up to the girl's dormitory to get changed for bed. I slid under the covers and drifted off. I was suddenly awoken when I heard someone come in. It was Hermione.

"Hi," I whispered.

"Oh hi Faye," she began. "Would you by any chance want to join S.P.E.W, it stands for Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare. To help house-elves?"

"Sure," I said.

"Great!" she beamed. "Night Faye!"

"Night 'Mione."


	5. Chapter 5

I woke up early the next morning. As I entered the common room I saw Harry sitting on the couch writing a letter to someone.

"Hey," I said.

He jumped up in fright.

"Oh hey Faye," he replied.

"Jumpy much?" I teased, taking a seat beside him. "Who you writing to?"

"Nosy much?"

"Very. Can you tell me who you're writing to?"

He covered up the top of the letter with his hand. "No."

I sighed. "Kay."

**_Harry's POV _**

Faye sighed. "Kay."

I had to admit, I was being a little rude, but she'd freak out if I told her I was writing to the most wanted man in the whole of Great Britain, so it wasn't an option. It was weird the way in the past few days, she had become so much more confident and she was chatting to everyone, whereas before, hardly anyone knew she existed, apart from those Ravenclaw friends of hers. Apparently, Fawley was going out with the Hufflepuff seeker and captain, Diggory, he seemed nice though.

I tried to think of a topic.

"D'you like Moody?" was all I managed to come up with.

She shook her head. "He's a bit – well, scary and insensitive."

"I agree. See you at breakfast then?"

"Sure thang, chicken wang," she joked in a fake American accent.

I laughed. "See ya."

She nodded and went up to her dorm.

She was beautiful. She had reddish-brown hair that went down to her breasts. Her skin was as white as snow and her eyes were a piercing shade of blue. She also had bloody red lips. Her only flaw was that her nose was a pit pointy, but to be honest that didn't matter. She was still gorgeous.

**_Faye's POV_**

Harry laughed. "See ya," he said as I made my way up to my dorm. Hermione was in the bathroom brushing her hair while Parvati was having a shower. Lavender was finishing some Transfiguration homework that McGonagall assigned us the day before.

"Why'd you go downstairs?" Hermione asked while putting down the wooden brush.

"Dunno," I replied. "Forgotten, not too important I suppose."

She shrugged and put her satchel on her back. "Suppose. See you at breakfast."

"Bye."

She left as I got ready. I put on my clothes, tied my hair up in a side-French braid, and headed off to breakfast, only to be interrupted on the way by my favourite set of twins.

"Hey Tonks," said Fred.

"Hey Hooligan-in-the-Making," said George.

"How's my favourite set of twins?" I asked mockingly.

"Awww….thanks Tonks," mocked George.

"You're welcome. Now to what do I owe this great pleasure?"

"We want _you _to help us with a pranks," said Fred.

I sighed. "Why?"

"Because you were basically unknown to most of the school for three years," said Fred.

"And we figured you'd want to – you know – make your mark on the school," said George.

I smirked. "Go on."

They joined in on my smirk. "We want to put belch powder in McGonagall's tea. She always has tea before Transfiguration, the first class, and you'd be able to spike it," George explained.

"And how will I go into her class before Transfiguration?"

"Simple, say you have to ask her about Transfiguration," Fred proposed.

"A real hard question, so she'd have to go looking for a book," said George.

"And what should I ask her?"

"The difference between Rampadiona and Elisadus," said George.

"What are those two?"

"There nothing," Fred mused.

"Nothing?" I asked.

"We made them up," said Geoge.

"Brilliant, aren't we?"

"Exceptional," I added.

"So you'll do it?"

"Yes I will, but why d'you ask me? Apart from the part that I want to make my mark on the world as you put it."

"Because Minnie loves you! You're the goody-two-shoes! And she'll _never _expect you," George said.

"And what happens when she can't find anything?"

"We've thought of that," said Fred.

"We're going to set off some dungbombs in the hall. Then she'll go running. You just need to scratch your back and the dungbombs are off. We'll be watchin' you, by the way," said George.

"Brilliant," I complimented.

"Got to go now," said Fred.

"See ya," I replied, smiling.

They dashed off to breakfast and I followed them albeit slower. As I walked through the door I was taken in surprise by a beaming Sybil.

"Wazzup Sybs?" I joked.

"First of all, do _not _and I repeat _not _call me Sybs again! And second of all, Cedric and I are going out!"

"That's great Syb**il**. He's alright, I s'pose."

"You suppose? You suppose! He's brilliant! And an amazing kisser!"

"I did _not _need to hear that, thank you very much!"

"I better be heading off. Rose and Cho are waiting for me at the Ravenclaw table. See ya Faye!"

"Bye."

I headed over to my table. Ron, Harry and Fred and George were sitting there. Harry and Ron were joking about Divination, and Fred and George were planning for their next big prank. Last night the Durmstrang and Beaubatons lot arrived, and Dumbledore announced the Goblet of Fire, an impartial judge that would decide the champions for each of the schools, although you have to be seventeen and over to enter the tournament, much to Fred, George and a few others' dismay. I personally couldn't care less about the whole thing. I remember when the Beauxbaton's girls walked in. Most of them were veelas. As they walked through all the boys clapped, Harry almost stood up before I pulled back down, not wanting him to make a fool of himself in front of everyone.

"It's a real bummer though," Ron started. "I mean, that just because we're young we can't enter the-"

"Biggest suicide attempt of the century?" I interrupted. "Anyone who signs up is asking for death! Have you even opened a book about it?" he shook his head. "Well if you did you'd see that people _die _in these competitions! It's likely that if you go in you'll probably come back with your head chopped off!"

"Jeez Faye!" Ron said, holding up his hands in surrender. "No need to bum us out!"

"There was every need possible!"

Hermione rushed up to the table and sat down beside me.

"I hate her!" she shouted.

"Who?" I asked.

"Stupid Fawley!"

"What has she done?" Harry asked, looking at me, I continued to look at Hermione like Sybil was _not _my best friend.

"I was in the library an hour ago studying about house elves, and she comes up to me with her group of girls. Then they started asking me to do their Potions homework. I said no, and that made them angry so they started calling me names. Fawley called me a mudblood."

I gasped. "What?!"

"You heard me! A mudblood! Despite the fact that Rose Richards is a muggle-born! And then I told her to bug off, so they began to call me worse names like a b-b-bitch and a s-s-slut and a who-whore," she was now in tears and I pulled her into a comforting hug.

"You are none of those things," I said comfortingly. "You are kind, and intelligent and just plain bloody brilliant!"

Harry and Ron nodded in agreement.

"But you're her-her f-friend!" said Hermione.

"Not anymore. Someone who calls one of my best friends a mudblood is not my friend, nor are they my acquaintance, they are my enemy," I told her while plotting my revenge. "And my enemies –well- let's just say they don't get off easy…"

Hermione laughed. As did Ron and Harry. I had no idea what they were laughing at, but it was bloody infectious. I found myself clutching my stomach while I laughed.

These guys are my friends, I thought. I don't need Sybil or Rose.

Hermione and I went to the Great hall, a large goblet standing in the middle of the room. We sat on the benches on the left hand side. Hermione opened her book and began to read as I watched the people who put their names in.

All of a sudden a certain seventh Hufflepuff came in. His name being Cedric Diggory. He was surrounded by many boys who I believed to be in his year. He was quite tall with brown hair and gorgeous features.

He put his name in the goblet and glanced over at me, smiling. I blushed and smiled back. He walked out of the hall with the other boys.

Hermione nudged me and I looked over at her, she gave me a smirk which said, "I know you're smitten with him!"

I stuck my tongue out at her and she smiled as she stuck her head back into her book. Hermione and her books! I thought.

I looked behind me and saw Harry and Ron there. When did they get here?

Apparently Hermione read my mind.

"When did you two get here?"

"Long enough to see your two boyfriends enter their names in the goblet," Ron answered, smirking.

"He's _not _my boyfriend!" I shouted. "And may I ask who you accuse of being Hermione's boyfriend?"

"Viktor Krum. He looked over at her like she's the queen of the earth. Sickening really," Ron said.

"I thought you were his biggest fan, Ronald?" Hermione asked.

"Nope," Hermione was about to argue back before two red-heads barged in.

"Aging potion," said George.

"Popped it up this morning, by ourselves!" Fred said while glaring at me. I refused to help him in fear of getting in trouble. I also thought it would be too much stress.

"Whatever," I said, rolling my eyes.

"Brilliant, isn't it?" George asked while admiring his potion.

"It's not going to work!" Hermione sang.

"And why's that Granger?" George asked.

"You see that? It's an age-line! Dumbledore drew it himself!" she explained. Apparently the fact that Dumbledore made it was a good enough reason to stop them.

"So?" Fred asked.

"Someone as brilliant as Dumbledore wouldn't be fooled by something as pathetic and dim-witted as an aging potion!"

"Oh shut up 'Mione! I want to see these two with beards like the rest of them!" I exclaimed. "Go for it boys!"

They shot down and took a gulp of it. Hermione sent me a glare, and in return I sent a smirk. The stepped over the line and put their names in, but after they did, they flew backwards. I noticed something long and white on their faces.

"You said!" they both shouted before attacking each other. I grabbed Harry and Ron's arms and ran over, knowing Hermione wouldn't find this amusing like Harry, Ron and I did.

"Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!" we chanted.

Then Dumbledore ruined it by just walking in and sent them to the infirmary. That man's a genius, but he can be a real buzz kill when he has to.

* * *

We gathered for the announcing of the champions in the great hall again. I sat between Harry and Ron while Hermione sat beside Ron.

Dumbledore made a speech when I zoned out. I must have fallen asleep. I woke up to see Harry nudging me awake. I was leaning on his shoulder. I gave him a smile and he returned it. I set my eyes back on Dumbledore who picked up a piece of parchment that had flown out of the goblet's fire.

"And the Durmstrang champion is…Viktor Krum!" he shouted.

"No surprises there!" Ron shouted, although only Harry, Hermione and I could hear him.

"How bipolar can you get?" I remarked.

Viktor shook his hand and walked away from the professor and into a room.

Another piece of paper flew out of the goblet's fire.

"Then Beauxbaton's champion is…Fleur Delacour!"

"Oh look there disappointed!" Hermione said, pointing to the other Beauxbaton's girls who were crying.

"That, my little know-it-all, is the understatement of the century!" I stated.

The pretty girl walked up to the headmaster and shook his hand and he pointed to a door.

He took another piece of parchment and read out the next champion.

"The Hogwarts' champion is…Cedric Diggory!"

Cedric walked over and like his predessors, shuck Dumbledore's hand. As he walked towards the room, he gave me a flirty smile and I gave one back, I felt the tips of my hair going a reddish-pink from embarrassment. I turned my hair back to a reddish-brown. My natural hair colour was black, but I felt too much like a Black when I wore my hair black, that make sense? Guess not…

"Now that we have our three champions I-"

He was cut off by the goblet. It spit out another piece of parchment.

"Harry Potter," he whispered.

What?! Harry couldn't be, I mean, it must be a mistake.

"Harry Potter!" he shouted angrily.

He wouldn't move. He was too shocked, as was I.

"Harry, go!" Hermione said while pushing him forward.

Harry was in big, big trouble.


	6. Chapter 6

**_FAYE TONKS_**

**_YEAR FOUR_**

**_CHAPTER SIX_**

The hall was filled with rude remarks about Harry as he walked up to Dumbledore. He was shocked as well. He glanced over at Hermione, Ron and I and I gave him a half-hearted smile. Ron was glaring at him. He obviously thought Harry put his name in. At that moment, I wasn't sure if he put it in or not. He'd have to be a complete idiot with suicidal intentions to put his name in, and it's not like he hasn't had his chances. I thought about it and what reason did I have to accuse Harry of putting his name in the Goblet?

Harry walked up to Dumbledore who was eying him suspiciously. He handed him the piece of parchment.

"He's a cheat!"

"He isn't even seventeen yet!"

Professor McGonagall put a hand on his shoulder as she looked at him worriedly. The look on his face was enough to tell any intelligent person that he didn't put his name in the Goblet. He didn't want to be a champion, I knew that much.

He was on the receiving end of many glares and, in the case Hermione, all of the teacher and me, worried glances. He disappeared in through the door.

"Off to bed now," said Dumbledore weakly.

He and many of the teachers followed him down the stairs. Hermione and I shared a worried glance before making our way to the common room.

We walked in silence until we were past the Fat Lady.

"Lousy git," muttered Ron.

"Pardon me?" Hermione asked.

"I said 'lousy git'."

"Who's a 'lousy git'?"

"Harry stinkin' Potter!"

"Why?" Hermione questioned furiously.

"Oh I'll tell you why!" he practically shouted. "He put his name in the Goblet of Fire without telling me! Probably wanted all the glory for himself!"

"How can you say that?" I said.

"Because I can!" he yelled. "He loves the attention!"

"Did you see his face Ronald?" Hermione asked. "He was just as shocked as the rest of us!"

"He's a great actor then, isn't he? Got you fooled, eh Hermione?" he said. "What bout you Faye, do you believe that he put his name in the Goblet?"

Hermione and Ron stared at me, expecting an answer. I decided to be honest and tell them what I think.

"Well – um – at first I wasn't sure, but then I thought for what reason did he put his name in, I mean, he's had enough chances at death as it is! And his face – you can't put on a face like that, it was genuine I – I know it was!"

"Got you fooled then, hasn't he?" Ron said viscously. "The both of you, I can't believe you're taking his side!"

"We're not taking anyone's side! For goodness sake Ronald we're just stating our opinions! Are we not allowed to have opinions anymore if you don't approve of them? Is that it?" Hermione shouted.

"I'm going to bed," said Ron. "Come talk to me when you've come to your senses."

And with that he left us. _Oh brilliant_, I thought. _Here goes another war_.

I looked over at Hermione and saw that she was nearly in tears. She let out a whimper which told me that she was only stopping herself because I was there. I took her hand and dragged her to our dormitory. I sat her down on her bed and held her in my arms. She started to cry into my shoulder as I patted her head and stroked her hair.

"He-He's such an-an idiot!" sobbed Hermione. "He-He's so inconsiderate of-of other p-people's f-feelings!"

"I know," I whispered softly. "He's a nincompoop."

She half-laughed in between sobs. She pulled back and stared at me for a second.

"You're a lovely person, you know that Faye?"

"I try," I joked. "Now go to sleep. I'll handle Harry."

"But we should b-both be there for him," she said. "I'll be a b-bad friend if I don't go down!"

"I'll tell him you're upset and that you believe him. Is that okay?" she nodded. "Well then get some sleep. I'll see you in the morning."

I went down to the common room to see people surrounding and annoying Harry. Everyone was asking him how he did it.

I walked over to him and clasped his hand and dragged him over to the corner of the room.

"Gonna snog him Tonks?" George skitted.

"Oh shut up!" I snapped.

They laughed and I stuck my tongue out at him.

"I know you didn't do it," I said.

"You do?" he asked.

"Yes. Hermione does too, it's just that, well, Ron doesn't believe you."

"Why?"

"Because he thinks you're an attention seeking git."

"But I'm-"

"-Not," I interrupted. "I know. Are they going to force you to compete?"

He nodded.

"Of course," I said through gritted teeth. "They don't give a shit about you're safety, they only care about their reputations."

"Where's Hermione?" he asked.

"In our dorm. Ron upset her, she's crying up there. She wanted to come down, but she's a mess."

"Really?"

"Yes," I said. "I think you should get some rest. You're gonna have a rough day tomorrow."

"Why?"

"Let's see," I said sarcastically. "Harry Potter, they boy-who-lived got picked to compete in a deadly tournament despite all of the other attempts on his life by You-Know-Who. He _must _have put his name in to get more fame! We're all saying this because we're jealous gits!"

"Suppose."

"The Hufflepuffs will be angry that you stole the glory from Diggory. The Ravenclaws will be upset because you outsmarted the Goblet – I know you didn't but they don't know that – and they couldn't find out how. And the Slytherins will be either jealous of you getting more fame, like Malfoy, or will know that you don't want this and start to skit you."

"Wow. You've really given this a lot of thought."

"I know," I said. "Now get to bed. You'll need your strength."

"Night," he said.

"Night, Harry."

One word came to my mind.

One word described Harry's fate.

_Doomed_

* * *

The next morning Hermione and I waited for Harry to come down the spiral staircase.

"Hello," said Hermione, holding up a stack of toast. "I brought you this … want to go for a walk?"

"Good idea," said Harry.

We went downstairs, crossed the Entrance Hall quickly without looking in the Great Hall, and were soon striding across the lawn towards the lake. We kept moving, munching on our toast, as Harry told us what happened when he left the Gryffindor table.

"Well of course we knew you hadn't entered yourself," Hermione said. "The look on your face when Dumbledore read out your name! But the question is, who did put your name in? Because Moody's write Harry … I don't think any student could have done it … they'd never be able to fool the Goblet, or get over Dumbledore's –"

"Have either of you seen Ron?" Harry interrupted.

"Erm … yes … he was at Breakfast," she said.

"Does he still think I entered myself?" he asked.

"Well … no, I don't think so … not really," Hermione answered.

"What's that supposed to mean, not really?"

"Oh, Harry, isn't it obvious?" I said. "He's jealous!"

"_Jealous_?" Harry said incredulously. "Jealous of what? He wants to maje a prat of himself in front of the whole school, does he?"

"Look, Harry," I said. "It's always you who gets the attention, I _know _you don't ask for it," I added seeing Harry open his mouth furiously. "But he has all those brothers to compete with, and you're his best friend he always gets pushed aside whenever someone sees you, and he deals with it, but I suppose this is just one time too many."

"Great," said Harry bitterly. "Really great. Tell him I'll swap ant time he wants. Tell him he's welcome to it … people gawping at my forehead wherever I go ..."

"I'm, not telling him anything," I said shortly. "Tell him yourself. Hermione and I are not owls."

"I'm not running around after him trying to make him grow up!" Harry said, so loudly that several owls took flight in alarm. "Maybe he'll believe I'm not enjoying myself once I've got my neck broken or –"

"Don't say that!" I said. "It's not funny, not at all!"

"Harry I've been thinking – you know what we've got to do, don't you? Straight away, the moment we get back into the castle?"

"Give Ron a good kick up the-"

"_Write to Sirius_."

"Sirius! As in Sirius Black?"

"Yes, he's innocent," Hermione said. "It was Peter Pettigrew, he was an Animagus, a rat."

"Oh," I said. "He's my mum's second cousin."

"Really?" said Harry. "I never knew –"

"Okay, back to the more important subject!" Hermione said shortly. Harry and I shared a glance and smirked. "You've got to tell Sirius what's happened. He asked you to keep him posted on everything that's going on at Hogwarts … it's almost like he expected something like this to happen. I brought some parchment and a quill out with me –"

"Come off it," said Harry. "He came back to the country just because my scar twinged. He'll probably come bursting into the castle if I tell him someone's entered me in the Triwizard Tournament –"

"That would be amusing!" I joked. Harry and I bursted out laughing until Hermione shot me a look. "Sorry…"

"_He'd want you to tell him_," said Hermione sternly. "He's going to find out anyway –"

"How?"

"Honestly? You don't know?" I asked, Harry shook his head. "Harry, this Tournament's famous, _you're famous_, put two and two together, I'd be surprised if there isn't anything in the prophet already. And I'm sure Rita Skeeter is dying to twist something up –"

"Who?" Harry asked.

"Rita Skeeter, she's a writer for the Daily Prophet. She always writes lies in it, twisting up people's words. It's rare for her to even write one honest thing."

"OK, OK, I'll write to Sirius," Harry said, as he threw his last piece of toast into the lake. We watched it float for a moment before heading back to the castle.

"Whose owl am I going to use?" Harry asked as we climbed the stairs. "He told me not to use Hedwig again."

"Ask Ron if you can borrow –"

"I'm not asking Ron anything," Harry said flatly.

"You can use Bang," I said.

"Bang?" Hermione asked.

"Yes Bang, my owl. He's black so he won't be spotted during the night."

We went up to the owlery to get Bang. Hermione gave Harry parchment. He sat down against a wall and write his letter.

"Oh, Faye," said Harry. "What's your Mum's name?"

"Andromeda Tonks."

"Kay."

_(the letter)_

_Dear Sirius,_

_ You told me to keep you posted on what's happening at Hogwarts, so here it goes – I don't know if you heard, but the Triwizard Tournament's happening this year and on Saturday night I got picked as a fourth champion. I don't know who put my nsme in the Goblet of Fire, because I didn't. The other champion is Cedric Diggory._

_I was wondering if you know a woman named Andromeda Tonks? Her daughter's in my year, her names Faye Tonks. And was she a metamorphmagus? Because Faye is, and also her sister is, Nymphadora Tonks, the auror._

_ Hope you're OK, and Buckbeak – Harry._


End file.
